August | 2025 | Portraits of Wildflowers
10 posts published by Steve Schwartzman during August 2025| Portraits of Wildflowers
10 posts published by Steve Schwartzman during August 2025| Portraits of Wildflowers
Various places in Balcones District Park on August 23rd were home to various drying grass seed heads. I took the top picture with flash, and I’m not sure what kind of grass it was. For the portrait below, which I believe shows silver bluestem (Bothriochloa laguroides), I turned off the flash to let the […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
Out on the Blackland Prairie in eastern Pflugerville on August 28thI photographed a colony of snow-on-the-prairie, Euphorbia bicolor.A few sunflowers, Helianthus annuus, came along for the ride. § § § § § In a recent post a friend wrote that she chose to “combine two weekly updates into one.” That’s normal English, […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
Atop a prickly pear cactus tuna in Balcones District Park on August 23rd I spotted a bug and made several portraits of it. Only back home later when looking at an enlarged view on my computer monitor did I discover the much smaller nymph that was also there. Bugguide.net has identified the species as […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
Two years ago today I photographed this squirrel happily tearing apart and eating a bois d’arc fruit (Maclura pomifera) that had fallen on the ground. Though I was fairly close, the squirrel showed no signs of minding my presence as I took plenty of pictures. A post from 2020 offered a better view of […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
In Great Hills Park on August 15th I was taken with the way the sun backlit the leaf of a milkweed wine.Which of various milkweed vines that grow here it was, I’m not sure. A single pod hung from the vine: And here’s a detailed closeup of the hairy vine itself: […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
In the Mueller Greenway on August 22nd the Lady Eve drew my attention to this spider ensconcedin the web with which it had pulled a blade of grass into a loop. Pretty nifty, don’t you think? © 2025 Steven Schwartzman| Portraits of Wildflowers
In my local Great Hills Park on August 15th I made some studies of velvetleaf mallow (Allowissadula holosericea), a plant that the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center website describes this way: An attractive and eye-catching, but coarse-textured, shrub that reaches about 6 feet in height. Its large, chartreuse, heart-shaped leaves are velvety to the touch. […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
As much as we prize prairie flameleaf sumac (Rhus lanceolata) for its colorful fall foliage and fruit, the small tree’s dense clusters of summer flowers are a pleasure as well, and not only for people, as evidenced by this queen butterfly (Danaus gilippus) in Cedar Park on August 12th. § § § § § […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
Well, there’s not really a tale, just two short-horned grasshoppers that I photographed independently at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center on August 10th. The yellow one, which was only about 3/4 of an inch long and belongs to the genus Melanoplus, clung to a gayfeather plant (Liatris punctata var. mucronata). The brown one […]| Portraits of Wildflowers
We drove a couple of miles east from home this morning to Schroeter Neighborhood Park to go walking. Although Austin got a bit over half an inch of rain toward the end of last week, I wasn&#…| Portraits of Wildflowers
I’m always on the lookout for combinations of native plants. Tens of thousands of possibilities exist for two species of native plants to grow in proximity, so there’s no danger …| Portraits of Wildflowers
Yesterday you saw seed heads of Clematis texensis. However, by far the most common of the three Clematis species in central Texas is Clematis drummondii. When July and August roll around, it’…| Portraits of Wildflowers
This was a good year for bluebells (Eustoma sp.), as a whopping eight posts in July confirmed. At this late date it occurred to me to show two last photographs that differ from the nineteen i…| Portraits of Wildflowers
On July 26th, six days after taking a lot of close abstract jimsonweed pictures, in a different neighbor’s front yard and with a telephoto rather than a macro lens I made this dual portrait …| Portraits of Wildflowers
A neighbor’s front yard on July 20th yielded these close abstractions of jimsonweed flowers (Datura sp.).The first one coincidentally fits the “pinwheel” theme of a recent …| Portraits of Wildflowers
Perspectives on Nature Photography| Portraits of Wildflowers
By now you’ve probably seen videos or read articles about the disastrous and deadly flooding that hit Texas along the Guadalupe River near Kerrville on July 4th. Very heavy rain caused…| Portraits of Wildflowers
While walking to our first vista in Bryce Canyon National Park on July 14th I stopped briefly to photograph a squirrel, as you saw last time. Six minutes later I’d reached the rim and …| Portraits of Wildflowers
From the northern fringe of giant saguaros’ (Carnegiea gigantea)range in Arizona on July 9th, here are some closer views. You can call them more abstract, too. &nb…| Portraits of Wildflowers
If our recent trip had taken us as far south in Arizona as Tucson or even Phoenix, I’d have expected to see giant saguaros (Carnegiea gigantea) and would even have sought them out in t…| Portraits of Wildflowers
